A thought on the federal budget
Sometimes, in our medical system, we over-treat individuals. They start out with a medicine to treat one problem and that medicine upsets their stomach over time so they end up with another medicine which causes another problem which leads them to another physician and so on and so on until they are taking fifteen different medicines and seeing five or six different physicians.
It takes a smart physician (or a concerned family member) to step back and recognize that many of the problems are caused by another treatment. The proper course of action is to wean the person from the medications and see how he or she reacts.
The analogy applies to government as well. We have stimulated and regulated and legislated until the patient (our economy) doesn't resemble itself any more. The message being considered on the debt ceiling and the budget appears to be this: "Yeah, yeah, I know we shouldn't have spent all that money on those things but now isn't the time to fix that. Right now we need to treat this (debt ceiling) problem." (See the very smart Nicole Gelinas on this.)
Is there a person - politician or citizen - out there who would argue we have too little government? Can we agree on the highest level that government is too big?
I have no interest in a default (maybe a brief shutdown would do us some good?), but I look around at the federal dollars being spent and often wonder if those same dollars would be deployed that way if it was an investor spending his own money. I look at many of the requirements placed on us in the name of safety or protection and wonder how we all survived before those regulations. I read about the downright silly federal education requirements masquerading as "opportunities for funding" and wonder what would happen if teachers were allowed to teach a curriculum. I look at the lives ruined by a perverse set of incentives built into our welfare system. I look at my paycheck and wonder what I might do with just ten percent less going to the federal government.
I think the patient might perk up with a little less treatment.
It takes a smart physician (or a concerned family member) to step back and recognize that many of the problems are caused by another treatment. The proper course of action is to wean the person from the medications and see how he or she reacts.
The analogy applies to government as well. We have stimulated and regulated and legislated until the patient (our economy) doesn't resemble itself any more. The message being considered on the debt ceiling and the budget appears to be this: "Yeah, yeah, I know we shouldn't have spent all that money on those things but now isn't the time to fix that. Right now we need to treat this (debt ceiling) problem." (See the very smart Nicole Gelinas on this.)
Is there a person - politician or citizen - out there who would argue we have too little government? Can we agree on the highest level that government is too big?
I have no interest in a default (maybe a brief shutdown would do us some good?), but I look around at the federal dollars being spent and often wonder if those same dollars would be deployed that way if it was an investor spending his own money. I look at many of the requirements placed on us in the name of safety or protection and wonder how we all survived before those regulations. I read about the downright silly federal education requirements masquerading as "opportunities for funding" and wonder what would happen if teachers were allowed to teach a curriculum. I look at the lives ruined by a perverse set of incentives built into our welfare system. I look at my paycheck and wonder what I might do with just ten percent less going to the federal government.
I think the patient might perk up with a little less treatment.
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